Changeling
by Silberias
Summary: Jareth recognizes and understands Sarah's selfishness, and he loves her for it. As her time in the Labyrinth wanes, he looks for ways to keep her with him. Always.
1. Chapter 1

So a bit of backstory and my own personal assumptions of the Labyrinth: Jareth is, himself, a changeling and is the only creature of his kind in the Labyrinth. He _is_ the Goblin King, but only because he was the goblin Goblin King's adopted son. For all the people who think that there ought to be a Seelie/Unseelie Court aspect, I've thrown you a bone that he's an elf but that's the end of it. I actually really hate stories which incorporate elves and wizards and etc, etc. So here is this.

It's dedicated to a real cool Cat who helped it get written. He's an excellent writer.

* * *

><p>Jareth's mother had never wanted him, she had always wanted a daughter. In fact, Jareth was not actually her son, but rather the stolen child of an elvish woman who had carelessly wished her son away—Jareth's father had offered an exchange of his infant daughter for the three year old boy, seeing a kind of magical potential in Jareth which he did not in his daughter.<p>

The woman had chosen to adopt the little goblin girl in favor of her small blond son, and the Goblin King—barely a foot and a half taller than the boy—had wrapped the child into a relishing embrace before whisking back to the castle where his distraught wife searched for their daughter.

The memory of his parentage and the circumstances of it came to matter little to the Goblin King who delighted in every achievement of his son, rewarding him greatly when he excelled and sneaking him praises even when he failed—but it was a daily stand-off between the Goblin Queen and the little prince—who by 8 was taller than both of his parents—and she frequently spread mischief in the Labyrinth for the boy to get tangled in.

Jareth had learned to live with this, but it cemented a deep compassion for the wished-away children—empathy for their entire situation. Because Jareth's father was not often as entranced by the wish-aways as he had been with Jareth, and because of both his mothers—neither wanted him. When his mother died, refusing in her last days to see either Jareth (expectedly) or her husband (a bit of a surprise), his father had quickly followed.

Jareth, the little prince in nearly the entire kingdom's mind, was only _just_ not a teenager. He was a goblin in all but form and name—his elven name (as best could be pronounced by Undergrounders) being preserved by his spiteful mother who refused to rename him a proper goblin name (Like Hoggle, which meant 'faithful to the end' in goblin). And he was expected to become the Goblin King whilst mourning his parents—however flawed each of them had been, they had been his parents.

And so, much later in his life—and it, he realized was going to be a _long_ life, he was an elf after all, not a goblin—when he met Sarah Williams he couldn't help but love her. She didn't belong where she was, and she knew it—and she couldn't escape it. She had also wished so very _selfishly_—most often he arrived at the homes of young mothers at the end of their ropes, they literally could not feed their child or allow it to live in the conditions of their home. After that he got the too-much-too-young mothers (or fathers, or whoever, one did not have to be the child's parent to wish them away after all) who wanted to return to the lives they had led before. And then there were the so very _selfish_ ones, like Sarah.

Really, he had mused as she pleaded, it had been a night of babysitting, and for a teenager who had so few other engagements it should have been a trifle…

* * *

><p>Review?<p> 


	2. Chapter 2

And because Jareth appreciated that kind of selfishness, he couldn't help but love Sarah for it. Being in a place where everything fit but yourself, being asked to watch over something that was your duty, taking certain privileges for granted…She was lovely, and so he loved her. She was the same as he was, in a way. Their fathers had spoiled them, and their mothers didn't want them, and the responsibilities their parents asked of them were too much for their young worlds.

It had been many years since Jareth had felt as lost and overwhelmed as Sarah was, but the deep sting of responsibility at a young age—especially responsibilities he _knew_ were his despite everything—had twinged in him as he offered her the crystal (which she took it for granted, of course. Every time he produced one she could have asked for it and been done with the Labyrinth). He was selfish in that he didn't tell her that he could alleviate all of her "suffering" on a whim, because no one had offered him such a thing.

Her baby brother was as darling a boy as she was lovely—and Jareth wondered if he should just erase Sarah's memory of the Above and keep them both. He would have a woman to love, and a son to cherish—without having to barter for one as his father had. But Toby would have to go. _Toby_ was an even more foreign name than his own, and hearing Sarah constantly yelling it out in the Labyrinth—because he could hear her every word, but was content to let her play out her schemes—made him determined to rename the boy.

The blond baby would not face the same problems Jareth himself had so long ago, with a foreign name—although something vain in Jareth wanted to give the child his own name. Or something lovely in goblin, like Bleen which meant _kingly_, or Kiffle which meant _loved_—he couldn't really decide, and put it off. He would name the boy once he won him from Sarah truly.

_Sarah_. Her concepts of time, and fairness were so very alien to him and he was quite sure the novelty would never wear off. Her assumptions of life, about the Labyrinth were so very colored by the world she had been raised in—her view of him as her villain when all he was trying to do was to give in to every one of her selfish whims. She was an answer to him, but also a problem.

He so desperately wanted to keep her, but he couldn't as she was—he would outlive her by centuries, and that tore at an already ragged hole in his heart. His parents had been far more like her, far more mortal, than he—he was a changeling child, a goblin in the body of an elf, and they had died while he had still been a youth. Sarah would in all likelihood follow their path, and he would be left alone.

As he looked at her steadily making her way through his Labyrinth, he hit upon a solution—it would be an experimental magic at best—if it failed she would go back to her life in the Above still hating her brother, still unruly and selfish. But if it _worked_ she would stay with him, she would be his and would never want for the Above again. So he went into the tiny room where he kept Eternity—where time stood still within those four walls, ceiling, and floor—and devised the spells to keep her with him, to keep her living.

* * *

><p>Review?<p> 


	3. Chapter 3

Eventually after spending several weeks in Eternity, Jareth emerged—mere minutes after he had gone into the room—with a crystal in hand. It was the most perfect crystal he had ever woven, at least he hoped. An elf handling goblin magic—or an elf using elf-magic alongside goblin magic—was a tricky thing at best, and the spell had exploded in his face several times before he had managed to contain it within the sphere. There was no time to test it, to see if it would work, because only he could enter the room where he kept Eternity—well, where the Goblin King kept Eternity—and so he couldn't test the spell at his leisure.

But Jareth was certain it would work. So he paid a visit to Dwarf Hoggle, the Gate Gardener—how he hated that dwarf for the name his goblin parents had given him upon receiving him from Jareth—and delivered his lovely present, wrapped up in the most delicious fruit he could think of, with the rosiness of summer and the orange of warmth on the skin. With only a few words he ensured that his Labyrinth would prevent the dwarf from stealing any kisses belonging to him, as well as covering his work by having Sarah's trusted companion deliver it to her.

As he watched Hoggle shamble away towards where Sarah was calling, Jareth allowed himself to dance along to the song the Fireys were starting to sing. They would teach his Sarah a lesson about parties right before she was invited to one. His footsteps were merry as he twirled, kicking up magic at his heels, until he winked out of existence. The smile on his face lingered, however, for a long moment after the rest of him had disappeared.

The spell was merely something to trap her with, to keep her distracted while he worked the real magic on her, but it was also so much more. It would expose her assumptions about his Labyrinth, and show him the weaknesses she saw in it—and the spell combined with more of his magic would ensure that it never ended. His steps were jaunty as he picked up Toby—he really liked Kiffle more than Bleen, having thought about it for the weeks it had taken to figure out the spells—from the goblin he'd left the baby with. For the first time since acquiring the boy, he quieted in Jareth's arms which only made the king smile wider.

And then he heard Sarah's scream, after Hoggle's protests—hopefully he wouldn't need to reveal that the Bog of Stench's stench was curable with elf magic—and was glad of the quick precaution he'd taken against the dwarf. And against Sarah, but that was only because she didn't know better—and besides, she would have protested that it was _unfair._

As though a precious thing such as her, so young and human, would be able to understand the concept of _unfair_. If she had his life for a basis of comparison, she would judge her life a great deal fairer than his, he was sure.

* * *

><p>Review?<p> 


	4. Chapter 4

The Escher room was the best place to get caught up in a dream, because Jareth found if he woke he invariably fell straight back to dreaming. Something about the patterns of the staircases and archways, how they represented dreams, those things made it ideal. Little Toby—_Kiffle_—was safely suspended in a crystal, gently bobbing around the room. He wanted the boy near when he won.

The thing about getting into the dreams of others was to see their interpretations of their world, to see their base assumptions—and Jareth was very curious to see what Sarah thought of his Labyrinth, of what she perceived about it. Knowing was half the battle to getting her to understand his world, where she would be staying. If the spell worked, and of course it would work.

For a while he was content to let her dream on her own through the web he had devised, carefully stepping away from her, leaving a magical net in his wake—but always just out of her reach or gaze. It was lovely, watching her explore. It was heartbreaking to know she thought there were others like him in the Labyrinth, in the whole of the Underground.

But then it was time to let her catch him, and let her catch herself in his spell. It was going to be all so blissfully easy, he thought as he took her hand, wrapped a hand at her waist. She seemed to enjoy his singing, as her eyes fastened on his face as he spoke the magic. Jareth wasn't a fool, he knew that she would realize she was dreaming and try to escape—and he was going to use that against her. As painful as it was to allow herself to tug away from him, and to hear the sound of a shattered dream—terrible indeed, and why he avoided the Above as much as possible in recent centuries—he did it. Because Sarah would not be escaping.

Dwarf Hoggle had told her, as clearly as was possible in the Labyrinth—if you go into it, you'll never get back out again.

So as Sarah fell, disoriented and losing her memories, the magic Jareth had walked around her and spoken over her took charge—if she had fallen a bit faster she would have slipped through, but he knew the workings of his own world. There was a smile on his face as he opened his eyes in the Escher room—Kiffle was bouncing contentedly along a ceilingstair while snuggled, fast asleep inside of her own bubble was Sarah, still dressed in the gown she had dreamed.

Jareth picked himself up with a cocky little smile and a jig to his step and leapt away from his stairs up towards where the infant bobbed, popping the crystal bubble with ease and settling the child into his arms. He decided that they would remain in the Escher room for the rest of the 13 hours, until Sarah failed to take the boy from him—and to pass the time he would form and strengthen an enchantment on her and Kiffle to ensure that they would not gradually turn into goblins.

He had won himself a queen and an heir, all within a day. The jig was still in his step as he walked circles around Sarah, singing his spells over her once again.

* * *

><p>Review?<p> 


	5. Chapter 5

Keeping her young and keeping her human are different things entirely, let me kindly remind you. Next chapter will be the end, thank you for the short ride!

Enjoy!

* * *

><p>It was simple really, taking into account that Sarah was a daydreamer, it would not be hard to shock something out of her—several things, actually—and capture her indefinitely in a dream of her own creation. Within that dream she could do anything—if she really put her mind to it she would even be able to fly—while outside of it she would sleep on. It was splitting her dreaming mind into several but still keeping it whole.<p>

It meant that he caught Sarah in her entirety just before she fell out of her dream to wakefulness, still dressed in whatever she had clothed herself in—but made real—while part of her dreamt on. He had Sarah's physical form and all he had to do was keep that form asleep until her time limit had run out. There were still some issues to work out such as her (and Kiffle's) human lifespans, but a few weeks in the Eternity room tinkering with goblin ale would probably work wonders on that quibble.

Distantly the sounds of her two companions chittered in Jareth's ears, but he paid them no mind. Sarah would be returning to them soon enough, a dream shadow of herself. She was powerless so long as she could not actually wake—and as he walked and talked and soothed Kiffle, Jareth ensured that she would _not_. No matter what she did, even if she managed to confront him in her dream she would not win. At any rate, by now he was powerless to stop what had been begun—if he did not continue with the enchantment, and any which must follow it, Sarah would be trapped dreaming forever.

Of course that would be fine for her, she would never experience anything she didn't have the power to overcome—dreams were like that—but Jareth needed her to wake up at some point. He couldn't have a continually sleeping queen, it was unheard of…save for perhaps Queen Fidut who had slept for most of King Volby's reign, but no one in the Underground liked to talk about that particular set of rulers anyway.

He particularly wanted Sarah to be caught in what was usually called a waking-dream, what amounted to sleep walking and talking—and he planned on catching her dreaming-self when the girl reached the Escher room in her mind. Once he had her in that, he would present her to The Dwarf Hoggle—to whom Jareth would show great mercy in promoting him to Junkyarder, in an effort to clean up that abomidable place—as well as her other companions:

The little demon fox, wished away a thousand years ago and told by Jareth's father to guard what was then a valuable bridge, and that was centuries before the Bog of Stench began to emerge.

And then the creature which had been wished away only decades ago into Jareth's arms by an orangutan mother caught by poachers—the Labyrinth had sensed the mind of a young child and had magicked the baby just as it did any other, only it had miscalculated in how large it allowed the creature to grow.

Sarah knew their faces, and knew their voices—her dream would supply the rest. Probably summon up a party of some sort, where she pretended that she had won. Jareth loved these sorts of dreams, despite not being able to allow them to himself very often. Sarah would hopefully never know her true predicament, because Jareth would allow himself that one generosity towards her. He was, after all, just as selfish as she was.

* * *

><p>Review?<p> 


	6. Chapter 6

In the end, it's only forever.

* * *

><p>The clock struck twelve, and still Sarah slept on peacefully. To amuse himself and to pass the time, Jareth gently sat her so that he could inspect her hair. It was black, and brown—and blue and green and a violent color of red he found as his fingers wound their way through her thick locks, threading magic behind them. The magic brought out and enhanced all of the colors which the human eye could not see. Magic would bring out a lot more of Sarah than probably even he could predict. It would all show through, however in time.<p>

And he would need time, enough time to keep her forever. Because humans didn't live forever, they weakened and grayed and died. That would not happen to his Sarah. His fingers itched for an occupation, so he started to braid her long, magical hair. At a quarter to the thirteenth hour, Jareth hit upon how he would save her for himself. Steal her from her human fate. He would take a slice of eternity, he decided, and craft a necklace, a ring, and every bauble she might ever want out of it and wrap her fully in them. They would keep her from aging, and so long as she continued to dream, only half awake, she would never notice. She would never grow bored with how long her life extended, and Jareth was content with that. Sarah content in dreams, and Jareth content with Sarah.

With an errant wave, the bubble the little child was contained in drifted towards him. There was a merry bounce to it that made him smile as he looked at the red and white clothed infant. In ten minutes, Sarah would have lost the baby to him. And then she was his as well. He had failed to mention that unless she succeeded, she would have to find her _own_ way out of his Labyrinth. She probably assumed he would send her home as a reward for her victory.

But Sarah, he knew, dreamed of her victory, of her life, of her adventure. Tomorrow she would dream of being a princess, and the next she would dream of being an explorer, the day after a vivid adventure in the Outlands.

So he crooned a soft song, a lullaby, into her ear as the minutes ticked down to moments. A whimsical smile tinged his face and voice as Sarah's and Kiffle's time passed into eternity. They were his now, already gone from the minds of those Above who had known them. If Sarah ever asked who Kiffle had been, Jareth would tell her the truth—Kiffle was a wish-away, one who Sarah had fought very hard to keep. And if she ever asked where _she_ had come from, he would tell her the truth too: She had walked into his life out of a dream. He'd leave out the part that she walked right into her own dreams, that he'd trapped her here very much on purpose. His smile widened as his song slowed, eventually reaching a sweet silence. The little prince had been selfish, but he had won.

* * *

><p>Author's Notes: As I wrote this, it has become kind of my own personal canon for Labyrinth. Not exactly the happy children's tale, I know. But Jareth, Hoggle and I suppose the Wise Man are the only more than vaguely humanoids in the Labyrinth, all the rest are a bunch of crazy, mismatched characters. That's where I came up with the idea that Jareth was a wish-away. I <em>severely<em> dislike the Sidhe, Unseelie/Seelie, elves, wizards, Celtic magic, druid magic, fairy circles, etc etc that many stories resort to to explain Jareth. I feel like the answer to him is the very fact that his kingdom's population is based on the numbers of the unwanted. Eh, I'll leave your Jareth-backstory alone if you leave mine alone.

Also, Jareth is incredibly, incredibly vain and selfish. I thought of him as a wish-away, combined with that, and felt that the rest of this story wouldn't be out of line with the stuff he'd get up to. Not everyone gets a happy ending, either, but I think Jareth and Sarah each got their own happy endings this time. If only sort of.

* * *

><p>Review?<p> 


End file.
